In the present work the hydration of dicyclopentadiene (DCPD) has been studied in the presence of cation exchange resin catalyst. Ion exchange resin Amberlyst-15 was found to offer the best performance with more than 95% selectivity toward cydecanol and conversion as high as 15%. The literature suggests that the zeolites are more active than ion exchange resin catalysts for such reactions. However, this is one of those few liquid phase hydrations for which ion exchange resins offer much better performance in terms of both rate and selectivity toward alcohol. An important finding of our earlier study on this reaction is that the properties of the ion exchange resin catalyst are modified during the course of reaction, which helps in improving the reaction kinetics. In the present work, the kinetic studies have been discussed in detail and issues such as catalyst reusability and reasons for the rate enhancement have been addressed.